The 60th anniversary Brisbane Writers Festival (BWF) programme is here.
More than 200 events will take place across the city over six huge days in May. From suburban restaurants to Valley nightclubs, the 2022 programme exemplifies BWF’s ‘Where Our Stories Live’ vision, sharing stories ranging from the intimate to the epic and told by unique voices from across Australia and the Pacific.
“The spaces of our city plus the stories we tell create the place we live, and we hope this year’s Festival does Brisbane proud as it reflects our city’s culture, diversity and literary depth,” BWF CEO Sarah Runcie says.
The programme has been curated with input from guest curators Ellen van Neervan, Benjamin Law, Anne-Marie Te Whiu, Michaela Kolowski and Rhianna Patrick. It combines BWF fan favourite formats and programmes alongside a range of new, exciting initiatives.
“Alongside the return of popular programmes Word Play and In Your Suburb, we are excited to launch three new parts of the programme at this year’s Festival,” Sarah says.
“Our Country of Focus initiative presents a lavish program of more than 30 Aotearoa New Zealand and Pasifika talents, most of whom are new to BWF audiences.
“Whether it’s spoken word poetry of New Caledonia, vital feminist writing from Samoa, or pocket poetry from Papua New Guinea, we have so much to inspire literary adventuring.”
Brisbane As A Storied City is a new programme debuting at BWF 2022. Curated by Nick Earls, it pairs ten writers and poets with the places they’ve drawn inspiration from. For example, a banquet dinner with Benjamin Law at Sunnybank’s Landmark Restaurant, Yumi Stynes in conversation with ‘Pig City’ writer Andrew Stafford at The Zoo, and a presentation of Clare McFadden’s ‘The Flying Orchestra’ at Brisbane City Hall.
There will also be an expanded special event series including a Mother’s Day High Tea at Customs House with bestselling author Sally Hepworth, and ‘Those Two Girls’ Lise Carlaw and Sarah Wills.
Other highlights include bookend events ‘First Word’ and ‘Last Word’ by one of Australia’s finest Indigenous writers, Tony Birch; the Brisbane debut of writers’ battle Royale ‘Literary Death Match’; and actor Bryan Brown in his festival debut.
Check out the full programme here.
Brisbane Writers Festival runs from 3-8 May.
